Field Trip

Last Friday....


The only free exhibit, at the entrance, the many types of ball propellers

Went to Singapore Science Centre with Peter... Well, I'm MC, and there's really nothing to do at home, thus the educational trip.... The main thing was to visit the Star Wars Exhibition, and take a look around the Centre itself.

$18 dollars.

There must be something worth of so much money, so I brought my digital camera along for the ride, and take some photos while I'm at it.

Here are some photos:


star wars model

white soldier


dead star

Hell, disallowing photography with flashes can be a pain in the ass, and my film exposure rate cannot be set to a longer time... So I gave up taking the pictures, well, except for one..

reaction game

Peter got a high score of 48, but he couldn't get any higher than that.... As you can see, the highest score is the maximium of 99.

"One light spoilt lah~"

haha... okok ok I know, it's just a game....


fat x wing

On another note, do you know about the game, X-Wing VS Tie-Fighter? It actually got me thinking it's a spinoff of X-Men VS Street Fighter!

Now you see that I'm oh-so-not a Star Wars fan?

There are some photos that I could have taken, but the irritating phone calls are already distracting me... Really regret man..

Boring stuff
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Then there are the commentaries on the tiny LCD monitors whispering its way out on the tiny speakers....

Do something about the volume man... I had to lean near the monitor, and people were thinking I'm actually paranoid...

I can't believe I paid that much money to look at a bunch of 100 : 1 models.

But yeah, of course, there ARE some stuff that is interesting...

Foley Studio
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Foley -- Machine used to generate sound effects for movies, the effects nowadays usually prerecorded or electronically synthesized but originally created using mechanical noise making devices such as springs, flapping cards, beaters on wood blocks and cloth, etc. Named after Jack Donovan Foley (1891-1967) who pioneered the art of adding sound effects to movie soundtracks.

Basically, it's a studio where improvised sound overwrites the movie sounds that actually happen.

In scenes where massive amounts of people are interacting, it's simply impossible to position a microphone right above the action. Well, that's when objects are used as noise instruments to substitute for the sounds that are needed.

A simple foley act would require:

-1 ang moh rustling leaves
-1 ang moh banging the hot plate with it's wooden base
-1 young man stepping on a foot pump lookalike
-2 young men and a school girl making 'war cries' on the mike
-3 other school girls carrying two sponges in place of swords, as well as pieces of stone from a broken spice pounder to encourage the war cries from the school girl

-1 big guy making solid claps on mini cymbals (reducing the resonance/echos)
-1 big guy banging the hot plate with it's wooden base

-A scene where tons of rebels are fighting tons of white soldiers in the forest

And we make the noise.

The school girls started throwing the stones at the school girl who started shouting 'Ow', one of the young man making a donkey ass sound near the end of the scene, and the rest make their sounds at their own pace.

What's surprising:

-Whatever sounds we have made, actually hits a note with the whole thing!
-The actual sound, is actually some kind of music playing in the background, as well as the director giving word that they fight more seriously, and vague, vague sounds of plastic clashing against plastic...

Woo........

Ball Game
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ball game
Like a concentration game... where two players relax, sleep, daydream to get a tiny ball along a line, moving their their way to either end.

The relaxed ones will emit some brainwave that the headband will pick up, and cause some kind of response to the ball.

Peter and I were trying to get a deadlock, but it's freaking impossible... I was way way too excited, and Peter seems to be damn relaxed.

*Laughs Out* I think in the end I lost, as the ball ended up on my side.

But funny lah, the game say, whoever is the most relaxed will get the ball on his side, and the person taking care of the station said that Peter won, and he's the most relaxed.

Wat Da Fark?

The Force
---------------
Oh and there's this screen game, where you make movements with your hand, getting rid of the baddies on the screen, and getting some lame quotes out of it.... the losing quote wasn't so bad.... it's quite creepy in fact.

YOU LOSE
I sense much fear in you

Reeks of Gollum...

But when you win:

YOU WIN
Already reached your highest level (it's something like that for the first part)
No more further training that you need

Wah Lau! The winning part is so, so lame.... doesn't sound victorious at all loh!



The Science Centre itself
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And after which, we went to the Science Centre to take a look at the existing galleries... Well, to see if there are any new stuff...

I've got free access to the place, but not Peter, because his entry to the exhibition was a hush-hush matter, and no tickets were involved.

So Peter, with no tickets nearly lost the chance to enter.... until I smoked the counter girl that he had free access...

Peter also joined in on the smoking.

Hahaha... the girl seemed to relax the whole thing, and let us enter.

Ah, the Singapore Science Centre.... a place where no one will really pay to enter.

Luckily, there are some stuff that are actually catches my eye:


peter pixelated

This image of peter, is made up of many many images. trying it best to blend in. But it fails, ultimately looking like the crystalized version of him.


me before

Oh well, it won't hurt, but I forgot about the 'after' photo.... wah kaoz


hydro power


splosh

The splashing power of the block will cause an increase in water pressure, causing the dynamo in the tube to move, creating electricity! wow... amaze me man...


circus stuff


me this time

Peter and I getting turns to try out the hammer.... old circus thing you won't really see in singapore amusement parks.... lol


dunes

Dunes! Another one of the exhibits that caught my eye.... wooo... nice sand.. so that's how dunes are formed... now let's try directing the sand at one side to create a tornado!

Now the interesting part... the water playground! interesting crap...

Now there's one part where there're these boxes, with questions about water on the front covers.

Don't open it! If you do, water will spurt out from the insides, and the box will make sounds of baby giggling. People will take notice and look at you, and children will laugh out at how you fell for such a simple thing. Later on, passerbys will think how the hell you got so wet on your pants.

On my scientific attraction of the day!


air blower

You start with this air blower: a tube with warm air, that propels a ball into a cylinder looking like the next...

water puzzle
The cylinder, has an eye in the middle, and the ball goes through without a hint of trouble...hmmm....


The Launcher
And after which, it ends up here... to get propelled by a jet of water.... into the cone...


the rod is straight!



no it's not
and the hell..... i know how it happens, but it's seemingly impossible man, like some trick picture coming to life....



guess the numbers

And guess the number on the second row, 1st in line... If you can read something out of it, it can only mean one thing:


You're color-blind loh!!

Week...End?

It's a busy saturday, sunday and monday.

I swear, I've never been so busy during the weekend before. It's usually stay at home and slack for the morning, before catching up with people in the afternoon.

Saturday
--------------

Well, it seems to be a very exciting morning. Or so I thought before.

"If you're not in the team, don't bother helping them."

"There's no point preparing stuff for a team that doesn't care about you."

"If you had a wish, it's just your wishful thinking."


I actually had a near sleepless night. Guess what I'm supposed to do in the morning?

Take the Shuqun Secondary School Team on the school bus, and to the Padang.

I've just been with them for a day of training, and they are the shortest in height of all the schools playing in the tournament.

But I just had some kind of attachment, something like I wanted to belong. To play with people I can relate with.

On the bus, I got their names down, and proceeded to produce a statistics sheet for them.

As well as a short briefing on the formation they are going to attack.

On a positive note, they actually listened. Then they warmed up, and swinged the discs around. I felt kind of elated, thinking that I could actually help them.

But things are not as it seems to be, and it disappoints me.

In the first round, they were thrashed by Regent, 11-2.

Their turnover rate was damn high. And the opponents scored from there.

After the match, I told them not to give up, and start on practising the go-thru drill while they had the time.

They seemed to give the "who the hell are you" look and proceeded to play by themselves.

For me, it went downhill from there. I don't know about them, but Uncle Ra said to let them experience this tournament and go to the next.

It kind of reminds me of The Singapore Opens 04. I went there, and cheered for the team, helping with the 'up' calls. But in the end, I feel like it has no meaning at all. Hell, I'm not even sure if they appreciate it. It feels like that you're not in the team if you don't even share the hardships with them. Like it's some kind of redemption for yourself.

Oh well.... some stupid things aside, I had to run the publicity thing for Uncle Ra. Acting as the middleman, I had to tell the DJ to announce stuff about Ultimate Frisbee. Wah lau.... and out of the sudden, the DJ came to me with the wireless mike, saying he's speaking to the organiser of the tournament.

I freaked out from this point. Where is Uncle Ra?

But the thing has started, and what I said had quite a lot of 'errrrrrrrrrrrr..................' s in it, as well as stammering. Wah lau, even Nigel Lim tried to hide away from the DJ, leaving me alone.

I just mentioned about getting more information on www.singaporeultimate.com. And that's it.

And we found out that Uncle Ra went to Penisula Plaza to have a cup of coffee. WTF.

Off we go to the rest of the day....

Watched Ultraviolet with friends from camp.... should have watched the movie during the weekend. More on it later. After which is a little steamboat dinner at bugis, which got my friends from worrying about me being disorientated in AMK (the previous meeting place for the steamboat) to hopping mad because I switched off my phone, played HOTD4 until 7.30pm, and had to queue up for a table. But it all ends well... catching up on stuff... besides it's been a while since I had a steamboat.... Seoul Garden doesn't count! hahaha....

Couldn't go clubbing because Daniel Tan's down with the flu, and I got too sleepy waiting around for Weiliang to call me... I think the League Party @ Timbre went through the night.... either they or that got too tired to carry on, especially after the League Finals in the day.

Sunday... and Monday
------------
I actually agreed with Peter Zhong to help out with his IT assignment.

...I can't believe he's studying a Part Time IT Degree from Monash. Butttttttttt, according to him, it's the fastest way to get a degree quailification, and he wants to understand at least a bit.

The starting was pretty easy.... I taught him to list down what are the requirements of the problem, and figure out a way to solve it. The problem left is the techique to solve it... It involves trees, which got me stumped too.

His learning curve was too gentle, and I don't have the time to sit it out and go debugging at his pace... here's some pieces of dialogue that shows my sheer lack of time estimation... I initially thought I could finish it on Sunday Night at 10pm, and get back home for Monday's Medical Board.

"Don't worry, hopefully if you're fast, we can finish by 6pm"

"Maybe 10pm..."

"What's with this bug? Let's sleep first, and get rid of it, first thing in the morning. Then I'm going for my medical board."

"Alright, let's just say I reported sick for diahorrea and hope they call my handphone. If they do, you drive me back home. Immediately. Let's just hope I can finish by 6pm."

"What? All of these is finished, and you want to implement the save/load feature in too? Okok.... I'll explain everything to you when I'm done. Hopefully we can finish this by 10pm."

And I finished, explained in haste, the whole thing, it's already 12am. Tuesday Morning.

After which I went to Nigel Lim's house, and fixed up his modem, as well as his router...

By the time I reached home, it's already 5pm.

What.... a week...end.

Theorical Bullshit

I suddenly feel like whatever views that come out of my mouth, to a general audience, is just bullshit.

What if someone actually believes it?

What if someone clarifies what you say and finds out you're wrong in a sense?

It feels like the person is crying wolf. His credibility gets more and more vague.

Well, that's what I'm feeling like right now...

Rant and Rave of a Frustrated Guy

It's been a while since I've gotten such a headache......

I should have done it sooner... Discussion of monetary matters is such a sensitive issue...

"What's with you guys and all these 'hidden' charges? It's his idea right?"

Come on loh.... it's open-source software, surely there will be problems. If it's just setup and design, I would have finished it a long time ago.

Then you ask me to go down, and gather content, as well as photos...

That's where all the 'hidden' charges go.

But the original part, where you asked me to upload / moderate content by you, goes unnoticed?

Why?

Why did you assume it's part of the hidden charges?

I'm just doing my job.

I just want to get paid for the effort I've put in.

I'm not trying to take a huge fat slice of the pie out of you.

Oh well... it seems that you can't care to look after all...

Just what can I do to explain to you what the hell I'm charging you for, when all you can think is the 400 dollar budget?

I have already prepared a draft explaning everything in my email, and it's just standing there, waiting for the 'send' button to be clicked. Now I think a one to one talk with a cup of coffee is the solution now.

Now that the whining has started on both sides, I just can't gather back my motivation to do the write up on the event on saturday...

I just want to get back to just doing my original job, of uploading / moderating content...


... Should have discussed the event way before the whole thing, or after the big day this saturday.

Random Pictures

Taken From the Bayern Munich Club Singapore @ Toa Payoh. Germany Ambassador is the official guest of honour for the event. Somewhere in Nov 2005.

*Looks at Peter's Blog*

Who needs tickets? I got in for free!

But then again... the World Cup I have taken a photo with suddenly looks so fake. Either that, or the World Cup Travels to Singapore a lot of times...

It's a empty vintage bottle of alcohol... not that I care about drinks... what's a remy martin?

Anyway, My mum tilted the bottle upside down, and left it on .... the mop bucket..?

Yeah, the part where you squeeze dry the mop.... funny place to put, but as she says, it's clean....

Mum's the word.... so...

What happened next was that I'm supposed to mop the floor, so I moved the mop bucket, without realizing the glass bottle is still there... Without the support of the nearby wall, the bottle fell from 20 centimentres...

And broke its neck.

LOL.

Got nothing to say liao.....

The rest is boring shit, you might want to skip it if you want to....

And the following are the contents of the goodie bag from Singapore Ultimate Open's 2005

Pictures... you figure... i guess it's a waste of time, except for the last one.... a convenient way to brush you teeth.... I have a bad habit, and it's not being able to brush my molars with my brush. With this, it's an easy task to do....

Balm..... never use at all..... must... use....

Honey Lemon Tea Sweets... very popular in my fridge.... now left half packet liao... and EnerVon C... kept me concentrated throughout the fated field camp... well... until the last day....

Milo Drinks and Fruit Bar... the fruit bar is actually nice.... the lime cancels out the raw flavour you get from eating processed fruit bars.... and my dad drank up my beloved milo hybrids...

And not forgeting the sponsor of Sing Opens: Brewerkz!

My mother nearly used it for pre-CNY chores...... WTF.

And the STi cap.... guess my clothing is a good promoter of Subaru Products... Only thing is that I feel strange, wearing the symbolic blue Subaru Shirt, and the distinctive STi cap, walking around in MRTs....

Random Comments.

Late at the FRS Ultimate Frisbee Mini-Tourney... managed to catch a game of frisbee between Goh Chuck Ting and Muddy Grass. It's a good game, but alas... I seem so out of place... with the wrong clothes...

Maybe I'll try taking a look at the fields again in time, when I'm certified fit to play a game of frisbee... No point going there to demoralise people who are already playing...



But who will support the game if people like us don't?

Seems like all the people there are players and zero spectators.... left soon after that for Bugis to meet colleagues going to Ex. Pinnacle.

-----------------

And we... went to Seoul Garden today. Feeling was great, it's been a while since I've been there.

But things have changed.

The food is actually nice, until the pan's surface has a huge layer of soot on it.

"What, they are not changing the pans?"

"Where's the butter? What? The meat will ooze oil on its own??!!"

"Where's the atap chee?"

Yes, the legendary atap chee rocket incident. Yeah, I gasped at it the first time it happened. And Viridis did too ...(but that's nothing to be proud of... haha) Basically, at the end of cooking, you get the pan to high heat, and place a piece of atap chee on it. Depending on the surface area heated, it will rocket into the sky, with a spectacular 'pop' sound.

It's a tradition to try it out at every visit to seoul garden. But I guess, there are no more atap chees to play anymore. Haiz... and there's no alternative... the closest in appearance, the graceful aloe vera, doesn't work too... Too bad... I don't think I'll visit this place again... Besides, the price is a killer...

------------------
Took a bus home, SBS 170 from Queen St. Bus Terminal.

Looks like the Larkin Terminal in Johor. Looks so Malaysia... haha...

So does the bus stop with looping queue lines opposite Kranji MRT...

Busy.

Yeah... I'm on MC, and I'm too busy to blog...

Funny right...

No lah... NFS:MW hardcore now... 7 more races, 100% complete!

then there is this website i've got to finish by this month.... the release date is 1st April. what a joke man...

and... all the anime, all the manga, all the ... oh nvm that.. haha.

And the real reasons why CLAMP (yes the most famous manga-ka team of 4 in the world) is holding back X, why the drawings are so simplified nowadays, and all the photos of the artists who always hide in the backstage.

http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/feature.php?id=245

At least... there's a bit of X candy... : Tsubasa Chronicles... Syao Ran gets to one world, and the end of that world is shown... at least a bit.... and woo Kamui is around, so is Fumma... woo moe moe moe~!~!

Generally, Singaporeans are bastards.

Ok... Sometimes.

Ok maybe....

Somehow I feel like shooting myself in the foot as I'm writing this article.

"Please give your seat to those who need it more than you do."

Unless you justify your more important needs like resting your fat arses, sleeping, talking on the phone, looking at the floor, studying for tests, and looking at the other side wearing dark shades.

The trip to Simei MRT:

To Jurong East:
Seats were ample, but looking at the faces of the disgruntled passengers, I guess they haven't gotten their share of the Singapore Progress Package yet. Took a seat, and caught a bit of 40 winks.

To Simei:
Looking at the crowd approaching the doors, and the few seats left, I know for sure, I have to look oh so pitiful to get a seat.

Hahaha.... no point.... everyone is just too tired.

On the way to Queenstown, three seats opened up, but one over sized auntie, a busily-talking-on-the-phone professional white collar worker, and a pouty-looking female litterally scrambled for the seats.

I think all the while in the train, their main focus is looking at people who are about to leave their seats.

It was until Tanjong Pagar, that I finally got a seat....

My god.... Shame on you man.....

Fried Human Brains...

Ok it's official....

I'm so fucking tired....

I deserve some credit...

Trying out something new, and's it's called Mambo. Some kind of a content management system, or blog depending on the complexity. It looks pretty good, and being open-source, it's free too. Along with other nifty modules, and components, it makes content-based websites easy to build, rather than starting from scratch.

But.... as of now... it officially fried my brains out... the learning curve is steep... I kind of went over that... I think. But when it comes to customizing the site to the tiniest detail... My brain just wants to give up.

Anyway, I'm comtemplating on whether to personnally make a hack on the original system code to suit my needs.

I've made one before, and it made my head grow more white hair. Now I'm thinking whether I could avoid this, and make another turnaround...

Guh.... Mambo is great to use, difficult to master.